“Go on, Mike.”
“I met him in 1945, just after I got back from overseas. We were in Cincinnati during the time when hotel rooms were scarce. I had a room with twin beds and he was sleeping in the lobby. I invited him up to share a bed and he took me up on it. Then he was a captain in the Air Force, some kind of a purchasing agent, working out of Washington. We got drunk together in the morning, split up in the afternoon, and I didn’t see him again until last night. I ran into him in a bar where he was brooding into a beer feeling sorry for himself and we had a great reunion. I remember we changed bars about half a dozen times, then he suggested we park here for the night and we did. I bought a bottle and we finished it after we got up here. I think he began to get maudlin before we hit the sack but I can’t remember all the details. The next thing I knew somebody was beating my head trying to get me up.”
“Is that all?”
“Every bit of it, Pat.”
He stood up and looked around the room. One of the plain-clothes men anticipated his question and remarked, “Everything is untouched, sir.”
Pat nodded and knelt over to look at the body. I would like to have taken a look myself, but my stomach wouldn’t stand it. Pat didn’t speak to anyone in particular when he said, “Wound self-inflicted. No doubt about it.” His head jerked up in my direction. “You know, you’re going to lose your license over this, Mike.”
“I don’t know why. I didn’t shoot him,” I said sourly.
Fat Face sneered, “How do you know you didn’t, wise guy?”
“I never shoot people when I’m drunk,” I snarled, “unless they push me around and make like they’re tough.”
“Wise guy.”
“Yeah, real wise.”
“Cut it out, the both of you,” Pat snapped. Fat Face shut up and let me alone with my hangover. I slouched across the room to a chair in the corner and slid down into it. Pat was having a conference over by the door that wound up with everyone but Fat Face leaving. The door hadn’t closed shut before the coroner came in, complete with wicker basket and pallbearers.
The little men in my head started up with their hammers and chisels, so I closed my eyes and let my ears do the work. The medical examiner and the cops reached the same conclusion. It was my gun that shot him. A big round .45 fired at very close range. The fingerprint boys picked my prints off the rod and the other guy’s too. His were on top.
A call came in for Pat right then and while he was on the phone I heard Fat Face suggest something to the M.E. that brought me straight up in the chair.
Fat Face said, “... Murder just as easy. They were drunk and had an argument. Bright eyes plugged him and put the gun in his hand to make it look like suicide. Then he soused himself up with liquor to make it look good.”
The M.E. bobbed his head. “Reasonable enough.”
“You dirty fat slob, you!” I came out of the chair like a shot and spun him around on his heels. Cop or no cop, I would have caved his nose in for him if Pat hadn’t dropped the phone and stepped in between us. This time he took my arm and didn’t let go until he finished his phone call. When the body had been hoisted into the basket and carted off Pat unbuttoned his coat and motioned for me to sit on the bed.
I sat.
He had his hands in his pockets and he spoke as much to the plain-clothes man as to me. His words didn’t come easy, but he didn’t stumble over them exactly. “I’ve been waiting for this, Mike. You and that damn gun of yours were bound to get in trouble.”
“Stow it, Pat. You know I didn’t shoot the guy.”
“Do I?”
“Hell, you ought to ...?”
“Do you know you didn’t?”
“It was a closed room and I was so far gone I didn’t even hear the gun go off. You’ll get a paraffin test on the body that will prove it anyway. I’ll go for one myself and that will settle that. What are we jawing about?”
“About you and that rod, that’s what! If the guy was a suicide you’ll be up the creek without a license. They don’t like for people to be carrying firearms and a load of liquor too.”
He had me cold on that one. His eyes swept the room, seeing the clothes on the backs of the chairs, the empty whisky bottle on the windowsill, the stubs of cigarettes scattered all over the floor. My gun was on the desk along with a spent casing, with the white powder clotting in the oil, still showing the prints.
Pat closed his eyes and grimaced. “Let’s go, Mike,” he said.
I put on my coat over the empty holster and squeezed between the two of them for the ride down to headquarters. There was a parking-lot ticket in my pocket, so I didn’t worry about my heap. Fat Face had that look in his eyes that said he was hoping I’d make a break for it so he could bounce me one. It was rough having to disappoint the guy.
For once I was glad to have a friend in the department. Pat ran the tests off on me himself and had me stick around downstairs until the report was finished. I had the ash tray half filled before he came back down. “What did it show?” I asked him.
“You’re clean enough. The corpse carried the powder burns all right.”
“That’s a relief.”
His eyebrows went up. “Is it? The D.A. wants to have a little talk with you. It seems that you managed to find an awfully fussy hotel to play around in. The manager raised a stink and carried it all the way upstairs. Ready?”
I got up and followed him to the elevators, cursing my luck for running into an old buddy. What the hell got into the guy anyway? It would have been just as easy for him to jump out the damn window. The elevator stopped and we got out. It would have been better if there was an organ playing a dirge. I was right in the spirit for it.
The D.A. was a guy who had his charming moments, only this time there weren’t any photographers around. His face wore a tailor-made look of sarcasm and there was ice in his words. He told me to sit down then perched himself on the edge of the desk. While Pat was running through the details he never took his eyes off me nor let his expression change one bit. If he thought he was getting under my skin with his professional leer he had another think coming. I was just about to tell him he looked like a frog when he beat me to it.
“You’re done in this town, Mr. Hammer, I suppose you know that.”
What the hell could I say? He held all the cards.
He slid off the desk and stood at parade rest so I could admire his physique, I guess. “There were times when you proved yourself quite useful ... and quite trying. You let yourself get out of hand once too often. I’m sorry it happened this way, but it’s my opinion that the city is better off without you or your services.” The D.A. was getting a big whang out of this.
Pat shot him a dirty look, but kept his mouth shut. I wasn’t a clam. “Then I’m just another citizen again?”
“That’s right, with no license and no gun. Nor will you ever have one again.”
“Are you booking me for anything?”
“I can’t very well. I wish I could.”
He must have read what was coming in the lopsided grin I gave him because he got red from his collar up. “For a D.A. you’re a pain in the behind,” I said. “If it wasn’t for me the papers would have run you in the comic section long ago.”
“That will be enough, Mr. Hammer!”
“Shut up your yap or arrest me, otherwise I’ll exercise my rights as a citizen, and one of ’em happens to be objecting to the actions of any public official. You’ve been after my hide ever since you walked into this office because I had sense enough to know where to look for a few killers. It made nice copy for the press and you didn’t even get an honorable mention. All I have to say is this ... it’s a damn good thing the police are civil service. They have to have a little bit of common sense to get where they are. Maybe you were a good lawyer ... you should have kept at it and quit trying to be king of the cops.”
“Get out of here!” His voice was a short fuse ready to explode any second. I stood up and jammed on my hat. Pat was holding the door open. The D.A. said, “The very first time you so much as speed down Broadway, I’m going to see to it personally that you’re slapped with every charge in the book. That will make good press copy too.”
I stopped with my hand on the knob and sneered at him, then Pat jerked my sleeve and I closed the door. In the hallway he kept his peace until we reached the stairs; it was as long as he could hold it. “You’re a fool, Mike.”
“Nuts, Pat. It was his game all the way.”
“You could keep your trap closed, couldn’t you?”
“No!” I licked the dryness from my lips and stuck a cigarette in my mouth. “He’s been ready for me too long now. The jerk was happy to give me the shaft.”
“So you’re out of business.”
“Yeah. I’ll open up a grocery store.”
“It isn’t that funny, Mike. You’re a private investigator and a good cop when you have to be. There were times when I was glad to have you around. It’s over now. Come on in my office... we might as well have a drink on it.” He ushered me into his sanctum sanctorum and waved me into a chair. The bottom drawer of his desk had a special niche for a pint bottle and a few glasses, carefully concealed under a welter of blank forms. Pat drew two and handed one over to me. We toasted each other in silence, then spilled them down.
“It was a pretty good show while it lasted,” Pat said.
“Sure was,” I agreed, “sure was. What happens now?”
He put the bottle and glasses away and dropped into the swivel chair behind his desk. “You’ll be called in if there’s an inquest. The D.A. is liable to make it hard on you out of meanness. Meanwhile, you’re clear to do what you please. I vouched for you. Besides, you’re too well known to the boys to try to drop out of sight.”
“Buy your bread and butter from me, will you?”
Pat let out a laugh. “I wish you wouldn’t take it so lightly. You’re in the little black book right now on the special S-list.”
I pulled out my wallet and slid my license out of the card case and threw it on his desk. “I won’t be needing that any more.”
He picked it up and examined it sourly. A large envelope on the filing cabinet held my gun and the report sheet. He clipped the card to the form and started to put it back. On second thought he slid the magazine out of the rod and swore. “That’s nice. They put it in here with a full load.” He used his thumb to jack the shells out of the clip, spilling them on the desk.
“Want to kiss old betsy good-by, Mike?”
When I didn’t answer he said, “What are you thinking of?”
My eyes were squinted almost shut and I started to grin again. “Nothing,” I said, “nothing at all.”
He frowned at me while he dumped the stuff back in the envelope and closed it. My grin spread and he started to get mad. “All right, damn it, what’s so funny? I know that look ... I’ve seen it often enough. What’s going through that feeble mind of yours?”
“Just thoughts, Pat. Don’t be so hard on a poor unemployed pal, will you?”
“Let’s hear those thoughts.”
I picked a cigarette out of the container on his desk, then put it back after reading the label. “I was just thinking of a way to get that ticket back, that’s all.”
That seemed to relieve him. He sat down and tugged at his tie. “It’ll be a good trick if you can work it. I can’t see how you can.”
I thumbed a match and lit up a smoke. “It won’t be hard.”
“No? You think the D.A. will mail it back to you with his apologies?”
“I wouldn’t be a bit surprised.”
Pat kicked the swivel chair all the way around and glared at me. “You haven’t got your gun any more, you can’t hold him up.”
“No,” I laughed, “but I can make a deal with him. Either he
does
mail it back with his apologies or I’ll make a sap out of him.”
His palms cracked the desk and he was all cop again. This much wasn’t a game. “Do you know anything, Mike?”
“No more than you. Everything I told you was the truth. It’ll be easy to check and your laboratory backs up my statements. The guy was a suicide. I agree with you. He shot himself to pieces and I don’t know why or when. All I know is where and that doesn’t help. Now, have you heard enough?”
“No, you bastard, I haven’t.” This time he was grinning back at me. I shoved my hat on and left him there still grinning. When I closed the door I heard him kick the desk and swear to himself.
I walked out into the glaring brightness of midday, whistling through my teeth, though by rights I should have been in a blue funk. I hopped in a cab at the corner and gave him my office address. All the way uptown I kept thinking about Chester Wheeler, or what was left of him on the rug. An out-and-out suicide and my gun in 15 his mitt, they said. Private citizen Michael Hammer, that’s me. No ticket, no gun and no business, even my hangover was gone. The driver let me out in front of my building and I paid him off, walked in and pushed the bell for the elevator.
Velda was curled up in my big leather chair, her head buried in the paper. When I walked in she dropped it and looked at me. There were streaks across her face from wiping away the tears and her eyes were red. She tried to say something, sobbed and bit her lip.
“Take it easy, honey.” I threw my coat on the rack and pulled her to her feet.
“Oh, Mike, what happened?” It had been a long time since I’d seen Velda playing woman like this. My great big beautiful secretary was human after all. She was better this way.
I put my arms around her, running my fingers through the sleek midnight of her hair. I squeezed her gently and she put her head against my cheek. “Cut it, sugar, nothing is that bad. They took away my ticket and made me a Joe Doe. The D.A. finally got me where he wanted me.”
She shook her hair back and gave me a light tap in the ribs. “That insipid little squirt! I hope you clobbered him good!”
I grinned at her G.I. talk. “I called him a name, that’s what I did.”
“You should have clobbered him!” Her head went down on my shoulder and sniffed. “I’m sorry, Mike. I feel like a jerk for crying.”